Currently browsing Posts Tagged “Martial Arts”

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News Paper Clipping from the Time I Went to Switzerland

Posted by Sam Kressin in Karate, Martial Arts, Personal Journal

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The U.S. Tang Soo Do Nationals were held in San Diego in 1994 I won the Adult Light Weight Black Belt Division in sparring and went to Zurich Switzerland afterwards to participate in the International Youth Goodwill Tournament. I won my same division again the next year in Orlando Florida. Internationals News Clip

With Billy Robinson Circa 2009

Posted by Sam Kressin in Billy Robinson, Billy Robinson Photos, Catch Wrestling, Martial Arts Photos, Personal Journal

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What Do I remember about this camp? We trained for 16+ hours over the course of the weekend. We spend the morning covering stance, movement and footwork then hand fighting and the pivot. The afternnon was all take downs the Half Halch, Flying Mare, Knee Tap, Single Leg, Standing Achilles Ankle Lock, Front Headlock Take Over, Front and Rear Lateral Drops, Grovit, Standing Double Wrist Lock were some the take downs but the Pivot was what Billy was most concerened about. I can vividly recall Billy Instructing that day. The second day was spent on mat work. We did Positional drills, about 5 Different Toe Holds, Double Wrist and Top Wrist Locks, Key Lock, Short Sit Outs, Standing Up from a Defense Position, Arm Rolls, Texas Clover Leaf and a bunch of other stuff.

Training With Billy Robinson Circa 2009

Men Of Action A Nod To Aicondo

Posted by Sam Kressin in Vintage Martial Arts Advertisement, Worlds Deadliest

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Yesterday I published the Vintage Martial Arts Mail Order advertisement to be come a Registered Black Belt and learn Aicondo. Todays post is an illustration I did circa 2014 in nod to the, “simultaneous side kick and punch while neck chopping and opponent” behind you illustration in the Aicondo advertisement. Men of Action is just one of examples of many hidden nods and tributes I’ve embedded with in my Worlds Deadliest Web Comic. Many of them will go unnoticed to the lay person but for the real martial arts historians there is much to be discovered within the series. You can read my martial arts webcomic Worlds Deadliest online for free starting with Chapter 1 here.

Become a Registered Black Belt in Aicondo!

Posted by Sam Kressin in Martial Arts, Vintage Martial Arts Advertisement, Worlds Deadliest

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Another classic mail order martial arts course that ran in comic books and men’s magazines nation wide. For only $6.95 Aicondo will turn you into a deadly fighting machine. It is a deadly self-defense system using the best of Karate, Kung-Fu, Judo and Aikido. If I can learn how to  simultaneously punch and kicking the air while neck chopping an opponent behind me sign me up! I want to be a studly looking dude in a gi that can pose coolly while young women admire me! As great as the over the top ad copy in Aicondo is I love the illustrations in this ad the most. I’ve actually done original illustrations of my own in tribute to this advertisement in my Worlds Deadliest comic book. Check out Men of Action my nod to the simultaneous side kick punch neck chop double neck chop here. My nod to the guy standing in the gi with the admiring woman next him has not been published public yet. When I do publish it I will link to it here.

What’s On My White Board

Posted by Sam Kressin in Billy Robinson, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, Catch Wrestling, Martial Arts, Opinion, Personal Journal, San Diego Martial Arts Seminars

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Sams_White_Board

Not too long ago I posted here about how useless and annoying white boards are when it comes to martial arts coaching. Since I am also guilty of having a white board in my private studio I thought I might as well post a current picture of what it looks like. Below is a brief and somewhat incomplete transcription of everything on it. What you’ll notice is I made a lot of lists. This is because the brain is attracted to organization and order and people have been trying to organize techniques for training purposes since the dawn of martial arts. In reality nothing in fighting is organized and response needs to be based on real internalized skill and application not just a theoretical list.

  1. UPCOMING EVENTS that have not been updated in nearly 2 years! Yes at one time I would write upcoming events such as seminars, workshops, we use to even set up training sessions with other gyms whose owners  / coaches I’m friends with. Nowadays if something’s coming up I’ll just email everyone or tell them in person.
  2. Below UPCOMING EVENTS is BILLY’S SADDLE RIDE This is a list of techniques Billy taught me and wanted me to have down all pertaining to the Saddle Ride. I wrote them up there nearly 2 years ago as a reminder. Maybe I should practice that stuff.
  3. Next to UPCOMING EVENTS is Sparring Rounds. I have two younger kids training with me 17 / 18 yrs old who I required to do 50 rounds of sparring before I would teach them anything more in boxing. As you can see I checked off about 10 or 11 rounds before I just stopped keeping track. Today they’ve done hundreds of rounds and have learned a lot of new stuff.
  4. Next to SPARRING ROUNDS is Triangle Finishes. This is a list of about 7-8 ways to finish a triangle choke once you’ve captured your opponent in the position. Triangle chokes are one of the most difficult submissions to get really good at and also one of the easiest submissions to get caught in so I like everyone to have a real thorough knowledge base of it.
  5. Below TRIANGLE FINISHES is a list of fundamental boxing techniques I required those two young kids to learn first before doing their 50 rounds of sparring. It would be a good idea to make everyone do all that stuff again.
  6. RIGAN WORKSHOP Is a list of techniques we learned while attending a Seminar with Rigan Machado nearly two-years ago.
  7. Below RIGAN WORKSHOP is Submissions. This is a list of 6 submissions you can do from a triangle position in the event that you cannot finish the triangle. This was required knowledge and I’m pretty sure everyone who trains with me has forgotten all of it.
  8. Below SUBMISSIONS is the number 185. I have a client that trains with me privately once a week. He trains regularly at another gym chalked full of triangle masters. One of his goals is to be able to hit the triangle more often in sparring and get caught in the triangle less often. So I’m making him rep out a very specific triangle set up and finish one thousand times! So far he’s gotten to 185 yes we are still keeping track of this I’ll let you know what happens when he gets to a thousand.

Why You Should Not Use A White Board When Teaching Martial Arts

Posted by Sam Kressin in Martial Arts, Opinion

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1. Inorder to improve you will need to learn by doing.
2. White boards make people feel like they are in school or a formal educational setting. School is boring and formal education isn’t fun.
3. The class becomes too cerebral the white board will take you out of your body and put you back into your head.
4. Those who are inclined to learn the white board way usually are already very good at understanding mechanics, concepts and principals on an intellectual level but unable performe their understanding physically.

Double Dragon

Posted by Sam Kressin in Martial Arts, Opinion, Personal Journal

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I remember when this game was in every 7-11 and Arcade across the nation. There’s nothing cooler than two guys with blue and pink jeans some vests walking through the streets taking out a Gang with the side kicks, hair grabs and knees to get the girl friend back from the Big Boss.

Super Brawl 2000

Posted by Sam Kressin in Martial Arts

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Found this old fight card from a Super Brawl event I attended the year 2000. People new to MMA don’t understand at this time these events were illegal in majority of the States in the U.S. including California. Hawaii was one of the places that allowed sanctioned MMA fights to take place. Erik Paulson, Matt Huges and Rumina Sato were just a few of the fighters I saw compete before the general public even had a clue about what MMA was. Living in Hawaii at the time I was able to watch a lot of the Japanese Shoot fighters which eventually led me to seek out instruction in Catch Wrestling under the great Billy Robinson.

The Karate Kid: Daniel Son Is The Real Bully?

Posted by Sam Kressin in Karate, Martial Arts, Opinion

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The Karate Kid has for a long time been one of my all time favorite movies. I saw the film in the theater and it blew my mind. Now with this video out I don’t know what to think. It changes everything. Is Daniel really the Bully? or is this just an example of how someone can spin just about anything to mean something else.

Martial Arts Style Without Styles

Posted by Sam Kressin in Personal Journal

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The_Tao_of_Jeet_Kune_DoTrue story; in 2008 when I was coaching out of my Carlsbad gym I had a guy call up and ask if he could sublease space for his martial arts group.

I asked, “what style of martial arts will you guys be practicing?”

The guy replied, “We have no style.”

Me, “Ok so what martial art is this?”

Him, “We we are a style without styles we don’t fall under a specific martial art.”

Me, “Well what are you going to be doing; punches, kicks, wrist locks, throws, grappling, self-defense, weapons?”

Him, “We do everything and nothing I can’t say we do this or that or it will only place limitations on an art without limitation.”

Me, “If you can’t tell me what you’re going to be doing in here then I can’t sublease to you.”

Him, “We are all members of a meditation temple so you don’t have to worry.”

Michael Echanis Style Knife Throwing and Other Stuff

Posted by Sam Kressin in Comic Books, Martial Arts, Uncategorized, Worlds Deadliest

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Stumbled across this cool video today while doing more research for the collected print (and download) edition of Worlds Deadliest, Chapter 1; “Deathly Weapons.”

This video covers the Michael Echanis Style of Knife Throwing as it’s instructed in his 1978 classic; Knife Fighting, Knife Throwing for Combat

I’ve been working really hard to finished this first collected edition of my Martial Arts Web Comic Worlds Deadliest soon. The book will contain a number of never before published illustrations by myself, biographical essays on important martial artists and a number of additional articles and resources pertaining to martial arts even including some little known and obscure information about Dim Mak!

Hopefully the overall all the finished product will be the martial arts book you’ve always wanted to read that no one ever made.

Awesome San Diego Red Zone Knife Defense Workshop

Posted by Sam Kressin in Martial Arts

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We trained for nearly three hours today it was an awesome introduction to Jerry’s Red Zone Knife Defense material. In this workshop we went over unarmed verse the knife and dealt with someone trying to shank you. Prior to this workshop I had already trained knife defense in the Traditional Arts of Tang Soo Do and Aikido but I had done the most extensive amount of training in unarmed verse knife with Trent Suzuki a 4th degree black belt in the Filipino martial arts and at the time I was training with him a named expert in Hock Hockiem’s system in fact I even dug out my old Congress of American Knife Fighters training blade for this workshop. I still highly value the training I did with Trent and in the traditional arts and fell there was much value gained through those training experiences. The material Jerry presented and taught us today is however in my opinion the best knife training I’ve done to date. For those of you who missed out on this workshop we’ll be having Jerry back again soon stay tuned and don’t miss out on the next one.

Posted by Sam Kressin in Karate, Martial Arts

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Having trained extensively in Korean martial arts I found this article of intrest. Although through my own research I don’t agree with everything stated in this article the author does remain relatively objective clearing up many commonly believed myths created about Tae Kwon Do’s orgins. This was originally published in the book: Thomas A. Green, and Joseph R. Svinth (EDs.), Martial Arts in the Modern World. Westport: Praeger, 2003.